Room
Kris Verduyckt. — © belga
A Vooruit bill banning fully autonomous weapons will no longer be on the agenda of the last plenary meeting of the legislature. The proposal has already received the green light in the House committee, but according to initiator Kris Verduyckt, the N-VA is blocking the plenary vote.
Last month, the House Committee on National Defense approved a bill by Verduyckt that bans the trade in, production of and deployment of autonomous weapon systems. These weapons – ‘killer robots’ in the jargon – decide life and death without human intervention and therefore on the basis of algorithms. Verduyckt calls this “more than a bridge too far from an ethical point of view”.
A second reading was held at the request of the opposition party N-VA. The Flemish nationalists are not convinced of the legislative quality of the proposal, but also fear that our country will miss out on a technological evolution that could cost jobs.
Under normal circumstances, a second reading is more of a formality. The procedure should have taken place last week, but according to Vooruit, the chairman of the National Defense Committee, N-VA MP Peter Buysrogge, suddenly changed the agenda, causing Verduyckt’s text to be at the bottom. Because there was a long debate about a liberal resolution proposal on the arming of drones, there was no time left for the proposal on killer robots.
“Never experienced this before”
The second reading could have taken place on Tuesday or Wednesday, but the Conference of Presidents, which regulates the work in the House, decided on Monday afternoon not to do so, according to Verduyckt. The body decides by consensus and the N-VA blocked an additional meeting of the National Defense Committee, he says.
Verduyckt reacts very disappointed to that decision. He accuses Buysrogge of abusing his position as Commission chairman. “I’ve never experienced this before,” he says. Verduyckt speaks of a “missed opportunity given the international context of an increasing international arms race”.
